Snapshots
by addicted.writer
Summary: Just a few drabbles I smashed together.


**Summary: Here's a bunch of shorts for your entertainment and mine. (OH, and you'll probably find a bunch of careless mistakes; that's just me being lazy) Enjoy!**

**Snapshots**

**Misconception**

As he contemplates his mistake, he knows that his wife won't like it one bit. That once she's discovered his misjudgment, she'll most likely take a swan dive off the deep end, because God knows that over the past few weeks she's been teetering precariously on the edge. He's done his very best to help her out, but it just seems like all he's doing is managing to irritate and stress her out more. He can see her already; brow furrowed, massaging her temples, irritated sigh. And then she'll start giving him the cold shoulder _after _handing his ass to him on a platter. She's wanted to do that all week as it is.

What is a man to do?

Well, this man has two options; he can fess up to his mistake and weather the tumultuous storm that is Olivia Benson-Amaro **or **he can blame it on one of his sisters. Now the sensible thing to do would be to simply tell Olivia that he fucked up, but no one's ever accused him of being very sensible where Olivia's involved. When it comes to avoiding upsetting his wife, all of his levelheadedness sails out of the window.

And thatis only **part** of the problem.

"Zara, I'm not going to tell you again," Olivia declares as she descends the stairs, "the longer you take to get dressed, the longer it takes for us to leave! And I know you don't wanna be late for your own birthday party!"

"Okay mom!" Zara exclaims and Liv can practically feel the attitude in her daughter's words.

Olivia takes a deep breath and runs her fingers through her hair, going through her mental list of 'to-do's' for Zara's 13th birthday party. She walks into the kitchen, preparing herself for the onslaught of teenagers who will soon be clouding her vision and, later, filing into her home.

"I hope you didn't ruin that cake, Amaro," Olivia tells her husband as she grabs a bottle of water from the refrigerator. "It was designed by your daughter and you know how she gets."

Nick looks up slowly, his face blank.

Liv looks at him, locks eyes with him, and she immediately knows that something's not right. She purses her lips together and closes her eyes for a moment, letting out air through her nose.

". . .Nick . . . What did you do?"

He immediately goes into defense mode. "It's not my fault, Liv. I just picked up the cake, like you instructed—"

"What did you do?"

"It's not my fault—"

"What. Did. You. Do?"

"They gave me the wrong cake."

"You don't even know what the cake looks like."

"But I'm pretty sure our daughter's name isn't Shamus Baker."

Olivia lets out a breath through her mouth.

"**YOU GOT THE WRONG CAKE**?!" their 13 year old daughter shrieks running over to her father's side and peering over his arm at the offending object. Her brown eyes widen. "**SHAMUS BAKER?! DAD!**"

"Zara—"

"**You guys are ruining my birthday!** **UGH!**"

"Okay, Zara, first of all, the dramatics aren't necessary," Olivia begins because all Nick can do is obviously nothing.

"But mom—"

"We're gonna get the cake fixed—"

"My party's in like 2 hours! How—"

Olivia holds up her hand. "Stop cutting me off, Zara. Now . . . we're gonna go back to the shop and see what they can do."

"What if they can't do anything?"

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. Go get your brother and sister while I straighten this up."

Zara huffs, shoots daggers at her father, then exits.

". . . Nick, I explicitly told you to check the cake before you even walked out of the building. How is that hard to do? It's not hard at all. Now you've got our daughter all stressed out and my nerves more shot than they've been all week."

"How is this my fault? This is their faults for giving me the wrong cake. This is not my fault."

Olivia rolls her eyes. ". . . You're right Nick, this is not your fault. This is my fault for trying to delegate duties that I knew wouldn't be done right if I, myself, didn't do them. I sent a _man _to do something a _woman _should've done."

"Right."

He regrets it the moment it tumbles out of his senseless mouth.

"You're incredible."

And she doesn't mean it in the good way.

**Unexpected**

"I'm pregnant, Nick."

They're lying facing eachother on their bed; Liv's hands tucked under her cheek, Nick's eyes closed. But he can still hear, he's not asleep.

His eyes pop open and he looks at Liv. She's chewing on her bottom lip, nervously anticipating his reaction to her unexpected news. Her eyes are filled with liquid and he thinks that her pregnancy explains a lot; from her sudden moodiness to her recent '24-hour bug.'

She moves one of her arms from under her cheek to under the pillow and she pulls something out, holding them between her index finger and thumb. They're 2 sticks, 2 white sticks—one with the word 'pregnant' on it clear as day and the other with a pink plus sign. He looks from the pregnancy tests back to her eyes just in time to catch a tear trickling across the bridge of her nose.

Nick smiles.

He reaches out and gently dries her tear, then takes her hand.

"I hope those are happy tears."

She closes her eyes and shakes her head, willing her tears to stay at bay.

". . . They're confused tears."

Nick chuckles and pulls her to him. Olivia scoots until her face is buried in his neck, then she lets out a soft sob.

"Why are you confused babe?"

"_Because_," she answers as if the answer is crystal clear. ". . . I'm not young anymore. And I know you remember how difficult my first pregnancy was. I can't go through that again."

"Who's to say that this pregnancy will be anything like your last?"

"I'm 46 years old, Nick, I should be going through menopause right now, not popping out another kid!"

"So are you saying you don't want this kid?"

Olivia pulls back and looks at her husband as if he's grown a second, third, and fourth head. "Of course I want this baby."

"Then what are you saying, Liv?"

More of her tears fall. ". . . I'm saying that this doesn't feel real."

"Well, it is real and you're carrying the evidence that it is . . . Liv, we shouldn't even be dwelling on the negative stuff right now, not ever. The fact of the matter is that we're having another baby in however many months, we're happy about this. This is great news, right? . . . Right?"

Olivia lets out a watery chuckle and a smile.

"Right."

Nick closes the space between them and kisses his wife.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

**Date . . . Or Fail?**

"What kind of date is this?" Olivia asks as she watches Nick's arm disappear down the side of his seat. As his seat falls back, she realizes that he was pulling up the chair's lever.

"I told you; it's not a date," he answers, his arms coming up to rest behind his head. "It's more like . . . quality time."

"So . . . a date," Liv replies.

Nick just shrugs. "Make yourself comfortable; stay a while."

"Nick what are you doing?"

"I'm improvising. You said we were in a rut and you were right. If we don't take time out for ourselves, for our marriage, we're gonna find ourselves in more trouble than we'll be able to dig ourselves out of."

". . . So you decided to take me out to _your car_?" Liv asks incredulously.

"I'm being spontaneous."

All Olivia can do is laugh. "You're so romantic babe," she says pulling the lever on the side of _her _chair to push it back.

**Jeans**

He's glad that they're home alone because he believes that his children seeing him drool over their mother's body would hardly go over well with Liv. But here they are, alone, getting ready for their night out with some of his old buddies.

Suddenly, staying in seems like a much better idea as he watches her from his perch on the living room sofa leaning over the sink to apply her makeup. All he can see is her ass and the way her black skinny jeans hugs her body in all the right places. Black is definitely her color.

"Are you ready Nick?" Olivia asks as she looks herself over.

Nick stands and walks toward the half bath that his wife is currently in, ignoring her question, his eyes burning with lust. When he doesn't reply she takes it to mean that he's still getting ready and continues to look herself over. She is surprised when he appears behind her, not noticing the look on his face.

"You're ready?" she asks, her eyes transfixed on her face.

As Olivia stands upright, Nick takes another step into her personal space. This time Olivia takes notice and her eyes lock with his in the mirror. Confusion flickers across her face, then understanding as Nick's strong hands slowly creep around her waist; starting at her hips and working their ways to her front. He pulls her so that her back is pressed against his front and his lips find her neck.

"Nick," she breathes, her bottle of mascara dangling between her fingers. "We are _not _doing this."

He moans. ". . . You smell . . . so good babe," he says, his lips lightly grazing the back of her neck.

Liv catches her bottom lip between her teeth while trying to resist her husband's practiced advances. He knows every button to press, knows every spot on her body that could potentially make her give in.

The combination of her perfume, body wash, and the scent that is so naturally her only proves to spur him on as she tilts her head to the side to allow him better access. She knows it's only a matter of time before she completely gives in despite the fact that they promised that they'd meet Nick's friend, Smitty, at 'O'Charley's'. And once she feels _'Little Nick' _pressed up against her back, she knows that they're going to be more than half an hour off schedule.

When he has her where he wants her he spins her around and crashes his lips onto hers, smearing her carefully applied lipstick. It's the last thing on her mind as she wraps her arms around his neck, sucking and pulling at his bottom lip hungrily. Nick allows her the control for less than a moment, then grasping her hips, he lifts her up and sets her down on the counter, successfully regaining the upper-hand. Her legs part automatically and he steps between them, continuing to kiss her.

_20 minutes later . . ._

With a new shirt on—because his original white-tee had been too wrinkled and unkempt to put back on—Nick opens the closet by the front door where they keep their jackets and coats as Olivia re-emerges looking as refreshed and rejuvenated and slightly pissed as ever. Her hair back in place and makeup retouched, she grabs her purse off the stand by the stairs and shoves her phone into the front compartment. Nick hands her his phone which she places next to hers—he, or should she say, _his phone _has a bad habit of falling out of his coat pocket whenever they go somewhere. They've invested in more than a few indestructible protective cases which he somehow manages to ruin, every time, and she refuses to invest in another phone for him.

"So what's the story this time? We had to get the kids off to my mother's or somebody had an accident?"

Olivia smirks and shrugs. "Or the truth; I am married to an insatiable sex addict who has horrible timing."

Nick laughs. ". . . Works for me."

**Work**

"I love you," Nick says as Olivia turns around to leave their room.

Their marriage isn't perfect. They have so much work to do where it's concerned, but they've made so much progress in their relationship and she has no idea how she could've ever been without him. But in some areas in their union, they could use help. While their communication skills have improved exponentially, they still have the tendency to let issues sit and stew until they are much bigger than they should ever be.

Their therapist has helped them realize that in order to resolve issues, they need to actively work together, talk things through, and come to a conclusion that they can agree upon. Granted, sometimes they will have to agree to disagree and choose their battles because not every little thing is worth fighting over. In the meantime, she's given them pointers on how to reel things back in when the fight or disagreement has gotten out of hand. The one thing that's resonated with Nick is reminding her that, no matter what, he is still completely in love with her.

Olivia stops in her tracks and takes a breath.

"I love you, Liv," he repeats. She can tell that he's still angry, but there's truth in his voice. It reminds her that walking out will solve nothing and if she wants a healthy and lasting marriage, then she needs to stay and work it out.

**Disclaimer: I really do own nothing (insert sad face).**


End file.
